Leaving the third creature to walk after him, Gabriel slipped the pistol back into the holster and ran, passing right by the back entrance to the supermarket.
His only goal now was to get back to Dylan and get the hell out of here.
CHAPTER TWELVE
JESSICA
Jessica gasped as the panic awoke her.
“Help! Help!”
She stood, leaving her makeshift bed of cheap gas station blankets behind, and ran to the storage room at the back of the building, behind the counter. When the door swung open, Jessica saw Melissa straddling Walt as he convulsed. His eyes were white, rolled into the back of his head, and his hips thrusted with aggressive succession.
His lips were moving, and Jessica squinted and turned her ear toward him, listening close to him mumbling something almost illegible.
“Get out,” he said, under faint breaths.
Then, he ceased convulsing and his chest stopped rising.
Melissa looked up at Jessica with a blushed face, covered in tears.
“Please help! God, please help him!”
The only thing Jessica knew to do was to try CPR—a skill she’d been required to learn when she took the job at the hotel. She urged Melissa out of the way and put her head to Walt’s chest, hearing a faint pulse. Her hands moved to his chest and she clasped them right above his sternum and began to perform compressions. After a series of pumps, she leaned down and breathed fresh air into his mouth, feeling his cold lips against hers and the coarse hair in his beard gone stiff.
Again, he mumbled something, and the volume was so faint, she wouldn’t have had heard what he was saying if she hadn’t been performing mouth to mouth.
“Get out of my head.”
“What?” Jessica asked.
“Out.” Walt closed his eyes.
Jessica repeated the steps two more times before Walt stopped moving entirely.
Her head lay against his chest and she heard nothing. The faded drum in his chest had stopped marching.
Melissa looked back and forth between her husband and Jessica.
For five more minutes, Jessica performed CPR. When all the color had flushed from his face and the beat in his heart hadn’t returned, Jessica resigned.
Leaving tears on his shirt, she looked up to the still man’s wife and shook her head.
Melissa cried out and let her entire body crumble to the ground.
Shoulders slumped, Jessica sat back onto her feet and wept for the man who’d saved her life and had now died because of it. She hardly knew the Kesslers, but such a debt could never be repaid, least of all now.
She stayed on her knees, watching Melissa clutch the cold hand of the man she loved, screams echoing through the small room.
***
Outside, the day hinted at more rain. Fog peeked over the mountains and the sun lay still, hidden behind a cluster of clouds. It wasn’t as cold as it had been the previous evening, and even with rain, Jessica knew she could drive them safely down the rest of the mountain. But for now, allowing Melissa time alone with the cold body of her dead husband seemed important, so Jessica waited outside. She sat just inside the sliding door of the van nursing an orange sports drink. Every few seconds, she found herself looking down at the cell phone in her hand to see if there was a signal. It had become a futile routine.
Each time she checked the phone she thought of her parents. It was the most desperate of feelings, to wonder if they were alive. In her heart, she wanted to believe they were. But only reaching them on the phone or getting to them would prove that.
She stepped onto the dirt for a moment and moved into the front of the van, sliding through the doorway and into the passenger seat. Jessica inserted the key into the ignition and turned it over halfway to power the radio on, searching for a signal. Again, there was nothing.
She looked back as she heard a bellow from inside the gas station. Jessica grabbed the gun and left a trail of dust behind her as she hurried to the door.
Inside, she watched Melissa back away from the shut door of the storage room. Her hands covered her mouth and she was slumped over in disbelief.
“Melissa,” Jessica said, getting no response.
Jessica tapped Melissa on the shoulder, flinching back as she turned and yelled out.
“It’s okay. It’s okay,” Jessica said, embracing Melissa.
“Walt,” Melissa cried into Jessica’s shoulder.
Jessica gently urged Melissa away.
“What about Walt?”
Melissa wiped her eyes and pointed to the room.
Banging started on the door. It made Jessica jump, and her first reaction was to pull the gun from the back of her pants.
“No,” Melissa yelled, pushing the weapon down toward the ground.
Jessica cocked her head.
“What’s behind the door, Melissa?”
She knew the answer. But for some reason, she felt the urge to ask. Wanted to hear it out loud.
The banging continued until the wood in the middle of the door split open and a face appeared.
The eyes; they’d changed. No more the gentle eyes of the delicate stranger who had saved her life. The eyes were empty. Soulless.
Melissa began to reach out to Walt as he continued ripping through the door.
Jessica pulled her back.
“We have to go.”
“No! I can’t leave him,” Melissa said. Her mind was nearly as lost as her husband’s.
Jessica’s grip around her tightened as the older woman fought.
“It’s not him, sweetie,” Jessica said. “He is gone.”
Half of Walt’s body—one leg and one arm—were through the door. He was spitting toward them through hungry teeth.
Jessica began walking backwards, dragging the woman who fought a little less with each step, but still reached after him.
Walt busted through the door just as they’d backed up to the front door of the store.
Jessica opened the door to leave, but Melissa put up one last fight.
As he got closer, Jessica drew the pistol and put three shots into Walt’s chest. Melissa screamed out. When the bullets didn’t faze him, though, she realized that the pale eyes were not of her husband; they were something else. She’d known all along, but fought to make the connection in her tired mind. It took watching Walt be shot multiple times in the chest for Melissa to comprehend that her husband was dead. She turned with Jessica and ran out the door, to the van.
Seeing the sliding panel door of the van was already open, Melissa jumped onto the backseat.
Walt pushed through the glass and continued a powerful limp toward them, howling into the open air. His hat was gone, revealing his ring of silver hair moving in the wind.
Jessica slipped when she ran around the front hood, tearing open the material on the knee of her pants and leaving a scrape on her flesh in the process. She grimaced, but got back to her feet and slid into the driver’s seat.
The key was still in the ignition and she turned it the rest of the way, hearing the engine roll over.
Walt reached the van and pounded his fists against the window of the sliding side panel door. On her back, with her head resting against the door on the other side of the van, Melissa looked into his dead eyes as he hit the glass. For a moment, she saw sadness and wondered if any part of him was left inside the pale eyes.
As the van pulled away, his eyes never left them. He limped behind them, arms flailing in the air as the sky opened and rain fell. Melissa watched him until he became smaller than one of the drops of rain.
“I love you,” she mumbled, blowing him one last kiss before the van turned a corner around the mountain.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
WILL
The cold rag against his forehead awoke Will in a stir. He opened his eyes and saw Holly with a look of concern over her face as she wrung the damp rag out in a bucket beside her. Her hair was up, making her eyes propel their beauty at him even more. He saw her full
lips moving, but it took a moment for his ears to catch back up with his eyes after having blacked out.
“Can you hear me?” She asked.
Will shook his head to try and wake himself up a little more. He was sitting against a wall, his legs straight out in front of him, stretched across the cold floor. He tried to bring his hands up so that he could scratch his nose, but he couldn’t. He rocked side to side, trying to remove his hands from the binding behind his back.
“What is this?” He asked Holly, furiously. He pulled on his hands, feeling the twine begin to rub his wrists raw.
She ignored him, dipping the rag back into a small bucket of water, and wringing it out, the sound of dripping water popping in Will’s ears.
They were in a large, empty room with no windows. The floor was solid concrete and the walls were a pale white. Doors were on either side of the room. Will could only see out of one of them, but it appeared to lead out into the main part of the warehouse.
“What the fuck is this?” He yelled at her again.
“I’ll tell you what this is.”
The voice came from a man on the other side of the room. His boots clicked across the floor as he approached Will.
“This is your new home,” the man said.
Will raised his head and looked the man up and down. He wore a fitted green t-shirt tucked into a pair of black slacks. He had medium length hair, dark and curly, and appeared to be in his mid-40’s. From what Will could tell, he appeared to be fit underneath the shirt, matched with a chiseled face under his beard.
“If you really want it to be, that is.” The man spoke in a slight, but elegant, Southern drawl.
“Who are you?” Will asked.
The man knelt down next to him, working a toothpick between his teeth. He let the pick rest between his lips on the right side of his mouth, like a cigarette.
“My name is David Ellis,” he said, sarcastically offering a handshake to Will, who shot him a frustrated look. David snickered.
“Oh, yeah. Right,” David said.
“What do you want? Why am I here?” Will asked.
David looked back at Holly, who was taking her hair down, straightening it out, and putting it back up in a ponytail.
“Holly, go grab Mr. Kessler here some water, will you?” David told Holly.
She walked to the other side of the room, flashing a flirtatious smile at Will, before walking out the door.
“How do you know my name?” Will asked.
David held up Will’s wallet. “You can tell a lot about a man by looking through his bag.”
David stood and began removing things from the bag, tossing them on the ground. He pulled out the pack of almonds and began to snack on them as he continued to talk to Will.
“We’ve been watching you,” David said.
“I bet you have. You look like a fuckin’ queer.”
David smiled.
Holly arrived back in the room with a bottle of water. She knelt down next to Will and put the bottle to his lips, tilting his head back so that he could hydrate.
Will smacked his lips as they began to moisten, staring back at her, and trying to figure out the motive behind her glaring smiles and her kindness.
“The way you handled those people to get on the roof was impressive,” David said. He reached down into the bag again and pulled out one of the bottles of water. Smiling, he showed it to Holly and shrugged.
Will swallowed his gulp of water and wiped his mouth on his shoulder. “What people?”
David pointed over his shoulder with his thumb. “Outside,” he said.
Will laughed. “People? Those aren’t fuckin’ people. Not anymore at least.”
David leaned in closer to Will and spoke in a firm tone with his Southern drawl. “What do you suggest I call them?”
Will put his head down and looked at the ground, not sure if he should say the word he was thinking. Then, it just came out. “Empties.”
David cocked his head to the side. He flicked his tongue, moving the toothpick to the opposite side of his mouth.
“Empties?”
Will shrugged. “That’s what I started calling them. They aren’t really people. Their minds and their souls are gone. Not the people we know, not anymore. They’re just empty bodies. Empties.”
David laughed, and the toothpick moved up and down in his mouth.
“Clever! I love it,” David said, sarcastically clapping his hands, which made Will glare at him. “We could use more people like you around here.” He looked over to Holly. “Don’t you think so, darlin’?”
She blushed and stared at Will. “That actually makes a lot of sense. Considering the fall and all.”
Will looked confused. “The fall?”
Holly tilted her head at him. “Yeah, the fall. Didn’t you see it when it happened?”
Will shook his head.
“Never mind all that,” David said.
Holly blushed and ran her hands through her hair, a ritual she’d carried with her since high school and perform when nervous.
“So,” David continued, “if you want to be part of my community, you have to earn it.”
Will spit at David’s feet.
“What if I don’t wanna be a part of your gay little club?”
David brought the back of his hand across Will’s face as hard as he could.
Holly gasped and covered her mouth, stepping back. David looked back at her and gave her a stern look that told her to stop being dramatic.
Blood came out of the side of Will’s mouth and he leaned to his right to spit some of it on the floor, as it was quickly collecting in his mouth. He moved his tongue around to make sure he wasn’t missing any teeth. From what he could tell, the only one missing was the one he had lost when he was younger and playing ice hockey.
David grabbed Will by the jaw and came within inches of his face.
“You’ll do what I say when you’re in my house,” David said in a demonic whisper. “Way I see it, you don’t have much of a choice. See…” David pulled out a handgun and Holly gasped again. He looked back at her.
“Get the fuck out of here,” David told Holly, using the gun to point to the door.
She left the room in a hurry and David turned back to Will, laughing.
He pointed to Will with the gun. Will dodged his head to keep the barrel from pointing at him.
“I think she likes you there, squirt,” David said, smiling still.
“Fuck her and fuck you,” Will said.
David ignored him.
“So, what’s it gonna be? You gonna do as I ask, and earn your keep in this place?”
David pointed the gun right at Will’s head.
“Or am I gonna have to blow your fucking brains out all over this wall right now?”
***
David shut the lights off in the room and closed the door behind him.
Holly was there, sitting in a chair and trying to gather herself. There were two others, a man and a woman, sitting at the table, and two armed men standing on the other side of the room, leaned up against the wall.
David walked over to Holly and slammed his hands down on the table.
“What the hell was that in there?”
Holly began to cry.
David put his hand on her chin and lifted her face up.
“You need to straighten that shit up,” he told her. “We can’t show any signs of weakness.”
“Come on, David. Leave her alone. We’re all still adapting and grieving from what’s happened. Give the girl a break.”
The voice came from the woman at the table. Her name was Diane Baldwin; she was one of David’s higher-ups in his small community, primarily because she was one of the oldest members of the group made up of only about ten people.
David looked back at Holly, whose face was beat red. He gave her a soft slap on the cheek, then stood up and began to walk out of the room.
Holly looked up.
“Did you kill him?�
�� She asked.
David looked back.
“Nah, darlin’. We need him.”
***
Less than an hour later, light came through the door as it opened. Will raised his head slowly, squinting his eyes to re-adjust to the light. The bleeding in his mouth had stopped, drying up around his lips and the stubble on his chin, and leaving him with a sick feeling.
Two men who Will hadn’t seen before approached him.
They leaned over and grabbed him, each taking one of his arms.
“Up you go,” one of the men said.
Will grimaced as he came to his feet. He hadn’t been on the ground that long, but it was solid concrete, and his hands were stuck behind his back. It made it feel as if he had been on that hard floor for days, and the joints in his knees and ankles popped as he stood.
They took Will into the next room, where he saw David, Holly, and a small group of others. In the middle of the room was a large, wooden table. The group sat around it, watching Will as he entered the room. David sat at the end of the table furthest away from Will. The two men sat Will down in a chair at the front of the room and then stood behind David.
Will looked to David with a blank stare on his face. He didn’t let his eyes leave the so-called leader’s eyes. David did the same, clasping his hands and leaning onto the table, never looking away from Will.
In fact, everyone in the room was staring at Will.
“So,” David began. “Have you decided to play nice and do as I say?”
Will just continued to stare at him. All he could think about was that he’d had a clear path out of the park when he’d seen Holly’s beautiful face as she waved to him from the dock, pleading for help. He was angry at himself for turning the truck around, wishing he had just kept driving, flat tire and all. Now, he was being held prisoner, forced to listen to some man pretend like he owned him.
“Let me just go ahead and tell you what I want,” David continued.
He cleared his throat.
“Next door, there is a warehouse, much like this one and much like the one you came from. And it’s overrun by those things.”
Empty Bodies: A Post-Apocalyptic Tale of Dystopian Survival (Book 1) Page 9